I found myself in the kitchen. Well, everyone says it’s the most important room of the house, so why not enter through it? It was dark inside and I flicked on my torch and had a pleasant surprise. By the far door that led into the main part of the cottage was an electric light switch. I pressed it down and a light came on. Martin Freeman had had electricity installed since Jane Judd’s last visit. I remembered then that there were poles all the way up alongside the dirt road.
Apart from being as crooked as Hampton Court maze, Martin Freeman was also untidy. The sitting room was large and comfortable, but there were old newspapers crumpled on the settee, and dirty glasses and an empty vin rose bottle on a side-table. The open fireplace was a foot high with old wood ash and was decorated on one side with a pair of gum boots and on the other by an old cavalry sword which had been used as a poker. Against the window that looked up the hill to the beech wood was a dining table with a cloth half over it and, on the cloth, the remains of a breakfast set-up, yellow egg-spill congealed hard on a plate and a paperbacked thriller propped against a Worcestershire sauce bottle. An open stairway ran up to the bedrooms. Round the newel post hung a pair of nylon stockings. Halfway up the stairs was an empty beer bottle with a faded red carnation stuck in it. I began to get a confused idea of Martin Freeman.
The main bedroom had a large double bed, unmade, covers flung back, the pillows crumpled. Over an armchair had been tossed a dressing gown, black with a white lightning-stripe motif all over it, and a red pyjama jacket. I found the trousers in the bathroom next door later. Just at this moment I was interested in a pile of letters, opened, that lay on the floor at the side of the bed. It was easy to tell that Freeman went down for his mail in the morning and came back to bed to read it. His procedure was clear. He opened an envelope, read the letter or contents, stuck it back in the envelope and dropped it on the floor.
I sat on the floor and began to go methodically through the pile. The bottom one dated the accumulation as being four months old. Most of the stuff was bills—and all of the envelopes had been addressed to Freeman, care of Lloyds Bank Ltd, 50 High Street, Canterbury, and then redirected to the cottage from there. A January bank statement showed that he was £45.11.6. overdrawn. Sorting out what I hoped might be the wheat from the chaff, I was left with:
1. A New Year’s card—postmark Firenze—inscribed ‘Buon Natale e Felice Anno Nuovo.’ Signed: Leon Pelegrina. The message and name on the card had been printed and the name Pelegrina was struck through in ink just to leave Leon. Obviously Leon was a friend. The printed address in one corner read: 23 Piazza Santo Spirito, Firenze. Freeman’s letter of resignation had been written from Florence.
2. A letter, only a few lines, from someone called Bill Dawson. It was on hotel stationery and in an hotel envelope—the Libya Palace Hotel, Tripoli, Libya. It was a month old, and read: ‘Long time no see or hear. Tour out here extended another three months. What about it? Find some excuse. We could make Sabratha this time. And you could have your revenge on the Wheelus course. Additional incentive (?) the charmer is due in Uaddan next month sometime.’
Well, if Freeman had taken off, it might be to Tripoli. Sabratha and Wheelus meant nothing to me. Charmer could be guessed at.
3. A statement of account rendered for £105.7.2. from a shipping and travel agency—Phs. Van Ommeren, 118 Park Lane, London, W.1. I might be able to check with them whether Freeman had gone to Libya.
These were the only things that seemed to me might be of significance. There was plenty of other stuff—mostly from women—that no man of discretion would have left kicking about on the floor. However, it was clear—from the bank redirecting—that Freeman hadn’t let any except very close friends—apart from Jane Judd—know about the cottage.
I did a quick tour of the bathroom and the other bedroom and then went down to the sitting room. It was still raining outside and getting dark. I found the cupboard under the stairs. There was half a bottle of whisky there and a couple of bottles of soda water. I got a clean glass from the kitchen and fixed myself a drink. I sat down in an armchair and put the drink on a side-table. The ashtray on it was full of golf tee pegs, and lying face down by it was a small framed photograph. Tidy-minded, I stood it up. It was worth bringing out into the light. It was a photograph of a girl of about . . . well, not far off thirty . . . not that I was concerned with her age. She wore baggy Arabian Night harem trousers, too diaphanous ever to keep out a cold desert wind, and two heavily sequined plaques over
